6 Best Tenant Screening Services 2020

MyRental Basic Plan

The rental background check provided in the company’s Basic plan is $19.99 and covers previous addresses, eviction histories, and multistate criminal background histories, including sex offender registries and federal terrorist watch lists. The price doesn’t include credit reporting or income verification. The service will also search court records for failure-to-pay rent notices, judgments for unpaid rent, and evictions.

MyRental Premium Plan

The Premium plan is $29.99 and adds on credit reporting, income and employment verification, and the option to have applicants pay for their own screening. MyRental gets its credit reporting from TransUnion, one of the three major credit reporting agencies. It’s a soft pull, so it won’t ding applicants’ credit profiles. You’ll receive raw credit data in the form of a reader-friendly risk score to help discern the applicant’s potential.

MyRental Premium Plus Plan

The Premium Plus plan is $34.99 and includes all the features of the Basic and Premium plans. In addition to the tenant background check services in those plans, the Premium Plus plan compares applicant scores to local averages, allowing the user to see other landlords’ acceptance rates for tenants with scores similar to the prospective tenant.

MyRental A La Carte

If landlords don’t need a full package, MyRental allows them to purchase individual reports. These rental background checks include an eviction history for $7.99, statewide criminal check for $9.99, county criminal records for $14.99, multistate criminal reports for $19.99, and credit histories for $14.99.

MyRental Unique Features

One unique feature of MyRental tenant screening services is if applicants are turned down, landlords can receive automatic adverse action letters, so landlords don’t have to create rejection letters and will also know if the applicant is FCRA-compliant. None of the other providers offer this service.

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RentPrep Tenant Background Check Plan

RentPrep has the lowest price of any provider for a detailed background check at $18.95. It includes Social Security number verification, address history, national eviction data, and information on judgments, liens, and bankruptcies. Employment verification and criminal history are not provided with this plan. If you need credit reporting, that costs an additional $9.95. Landlords also add on a national sex offender and criminal search for $4.

RentPrep Smart Move Plan

RentPrep Smart Move costs $38 per month and includes full credit reporting. Users pay $4.95 for the judgments and liens search. National sex offender search is included at no charge. Like MyRental, RentPrep uses TransUnion for its credit reporting. You’ll receive FICO scores in addition to basic information. Credit reports are a hard pull if landlord-initiated but a soft pull if the applicant pays for the screening.

RentPrep Unique Features

One unique feature of RentPrep is its live screeners where someone is manually verifying applicant information. Another unique feature is its no-nonsense approach to Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) compliance. RentPrep makes it a priority to know the laws and is proactive in complying with them, protecting landlords and property managers from accidentally breaking the law or discriminating against an applicant.

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LeaseRunner Credit Reporting Methods

LeaseRunner uses Experian credit reporting. The applicant authorizes the screening, so it’s considered a soft pull. LeaseRunner’s reporting utilizes VantageScore 3.0, which is a competitor to the FICO scoring system and intended to provide more useful data than raw credit file information. LeaseRunner does not generate adverse action letters automatically but does supply FCRA-compliant templates for clients to use.

LeaseRunner Criminal Background Checks

LeaseRunner criminal background report provides criminal records from all 50 states and Washington, D.C. Prison records, watch lists, sex offender information, parole and probation records, and terror watch list reporting make its criminal background reporting among the most robust of all the providers.

LeaseRunner Landlord, Prior Residence & Eviction Checks

With its eviction report option, LeaseRunner provides a nationwide search for up to 10 prior addresses and up to seven years of information. Court actions, judgments, and property damage claims are all tracked. Because LeaseRunner reports are ordered individually, ancillary information, such as Social Security number verification or bank account data, are only available with the purchase of additional reports.

LeaseRunner Income & Employment Verifications

LeaseRunner offers the Financial Profile report, which contains the applicants’ bank balances, deposits, and withdrawals to help develop a financial profile of the applicant. Credit reporting also provides income and employment information such as current and previous employers and other sources of income.

LeaseRunner Unique Features

One unique feature of LeaseRunner as a tenant screening service is there are no subscriptions and monthly fees. Instead, landlords choose the individual type of rental background check they want, pay for it, and are done. For example, they may not require a credit check but might want a criminal background check, or vice versa. It also offers free online rental application templates.

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Avail Rental Profile

The Rental Profile product at Avail allows landlords to screen tenants’ basic information. The service verifies the applicants’ rental history, employment history, and income. This basic service is free for landlords.

Avail Credit Plus

The Credit Plus option provides landlords with mid level verification, adding a TransUnion credit score, credit history, and adverse records history. This is a good product for landlords wanting to add credit verification to their tenant screening. Credit Plus is available for $25 per applicant.

Avail Full Screening

Full Screening from Avail includes all tenant background checks and verifications included in its basic and mid-level report with the addition of a nationwide criminal, terror list, and sex offender registry checks as well as previous eviction reports.

Avail Unique Features

Landlords can sign up for a monthly membership that allows them to manage one unit rental for free and includes its Full Screening product plus many other property management tools like online rent payment.

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TransUnion SmartMove SmartCheck Basic Plan

The SmartCheck Basic plan is $25 per applicant and gives a credit-based resident score along with a recommendation by TransUnion of whether or not to rent to the applicant. This plan also gives a nationwide criminal background check but doesn’t provide a full credit report offered by the more advanced plans.

TransUnion SmartMove SmartCheck Basic Plus Plan

The SmartCheck Basic Plus plan is $38 per applicant. Along with the features of the Basic plan, the Basic Plus plan offers data from TransUnion with full credit reporting on each applicant. The credit report is a soft pull on an applicant’s credit since the applicants are required to authorize it. This plan also offers previous landlord, residence and eviction checks, including a national eviction report.

TransUnion SmartMove SmartCheck Premium Plan

The SmartCheck Premium plan is the top plan and priced at $40 per applicant. In addition to the offerings of the other two plans, it also offers something called “Income Insights.” These are additional verifications that TransUnion SmartMove does to see if the applicant accurately reported his or her income. It reviews online records, financial behavior, and all income sources, and advises landlords if they should get additional proof of tenant income.

TransUnion SmartMove Unique Features

One unique feature of TransUnion SmartMove for tenant background screening is the applicant score feature. It’s a score of each applicant from TransUnion based on an analysis of more than 500,000 resident records. Similar to the National Tenant Network, it gives the property manager or landlord a recommendation to accept the applicants or deny them.

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TurboTenant Credit Reporting Methods

TurboTenant uses a soft credit pull, so it doesn’t impact the applicants’ FICO score. The report lists the applicants’ FICO score and the factors that are included in determining the score like the number of open and closed credit accounts, outstanding loans, and payment history. The company uses TransUnion.

TurboTenant Criminal Background Checks

TurboTenant conducts a more comprehensive nationwide rental background check than other tenant screening services. This advanced tenant background check is included automatically as part of the applicant screening fee. The check searches more than 200 million criminal records, so if a tenant has recently moved from another state, landlords likely will be able to find information about them.

TurboTenant Landlord, Prior Residence & Eviction Checks

TurboTenant only includes an eviction report with the $45 tenant screening option. Otherwise, an eviction tenant background check isn’t included. The $35 option includes the tenants’ prior residence and public records to show if any landlord-tenant related cases are outstanding.

TurboTenant Income & Employment Verifications

This is where TurboTenant falls short. It doesn’t provide any type of income verification. It recommends that landlords verify the income and current employment with the applicants’ employer. It doesn’t offer live screeners, so it’s up to the landlords to have the applicant sign a records release form, or call the applicants’ employers, and collect their pay stubs.

TurboTenant Unique Features

One unique feature of TurboTenant for tenant screening is that it’s not just a tenant screening service. It can also be used to post vacant rental listings and create flyers for rental units. For prospective renters, landlords can have the applicant fill out the application directly on the website.

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